Between the Lines

How about a fantastic new fairy tale written by bestselling adult author with her teenage daughter? If you have an open mind you will think this is great and a wonderful achievement, and you’ll want to read it, and when you do, you’ll find a lovely multi-dimensional fairy tale about a handsome prince and an ‘ordinary’ girl, where neither the route taken nor the goal reached at the end is what you thought it would be.

We are talking about Jodi Picoult, who writes a novel every year, and does a lot of research for every one. She also has several children, and I think a husband who folds the laundry, or some such thing. That must be why she felt she could squeeze in writing a book with her daughter Samantha ‘while she had nothing better to do.’ The idea for the plot was Samantha’s, and it took them a couple of years to write Between the Lines.

Basically we have a (wise but cowardly) prince in a fairy tale, and as you know, when a book isn’t being read, the characters in it have their own lives and can do what they like, rallying to their positions when a reader opens the book. And this prince (Oliver) wants to get out of his book, and when he finally discovers he can talk to (and be heard by) a teenage girl (Delilah), they fall in love and then they try to come up with a way for Oliver to get out.

Told on three levels, the fairy tale, Oliver’s ordinary life and Delilah’s life, we meet the characters from the fairy tale both as the characters they are supposed to be, as well as who they are in their spare time.

And I just love Socks, the prince’s faithful horse!

At one point I did wonder if I should side with Delilah’s mother who thinks her daughter has become unhinged, talking to a children’s book. No one else seems to hear Oliver, although it doesn’t help that he clams up when others are near.

You wonder how on earth this can be resolved, and I very much doubt that anyone can guess correctly. It’s different, and it’s a great deal of fun.

Illustrated throughout with lovely pictures by Yvonne Gilbert and Scott M Fischer. Just think, if the pictures weren’t there, Oliver and Delilah wouldn’t be able to meet, or fall in love.

4 responses to “Between the Lines”

I’m sure he will. So, you don’t fancy sitting down to write with ‘Miss Rosoff’? I can see it as a great way to hate someone very fast.
In this case, I don’t know who did what, but I do feel the plot idea is a good one, and life inside the book when the covers are closed is very interesting.
Really.

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